Monday, May 24, 2010

Homemade Strawberry Jam

This weekend the four of us went strawberry picking. It was interesting to see how content the children were. E hung close to his daddy, running to me once in a while. M picked a handful of berries...not all of them were ripe though. She enjoyed eating some, too, of course.

We picked over seven pounds of strawberries. I had already planned to make jam. Derek's grandma typically supplies us with strawberry freezer jam throughout the year, but I thought I'd try to make my own this summer. This was not the first time Grandma has inspired me to try to make something new. Unfortunately, we don't have room in our freezer to store anything long term, so I decided to can my jam.

I used the recipe that came with the Certo pectin (found near canning goods at my grocery store). You can see it at the Certo site, too. Amazingly, each batch has seven cups of sugar in it! I made two batches which used most of our strawberries! This morning I tried the jam on an English muffin, and boy, was it sweet! I will likely enjoy it a bit more in a PB&J sandwich.

In my first batch I did not use the butter that was an optional ingredient. It is supposed to limit the foam produced by the strawberries when they are cooked. In my second batch, I added the butter, and it helped immensely!

If you like strawberry jam, I would definitely suggest making some. If I can do it, so can you!

(The photo is from felt strawberries I made last year. I couldn't get a decent picture of my English muffin today.)